EIA to require data centers to disclose energy use nationwide

Electric bills, grid reliability and the battle over who pays for new transmission lines are moving to the center of Washington’s data-center debate. The U.S. Energy Information Administration said it will require data centers to disclose details of their energy use, a move that could give regulators and the public hard numbers on one of the fastest-growing sources of electricity demand.

The agency first launched three voluntary pilot field studies on March 25 to test how it can measure consumption at data centers. The pilots use web-based surveys in Texas and Washington state and in-person interviews in Northern Virginia and Washington, DC. EIA identified 196 companies operating data centers across those regions and asked each one to report on the energy use of at least one facility there.

A day later, Senators Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat, and Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican, pressed the EIA to make annual reporting mandatory for data centers and other large energy users. They said the federal government needs the data to hold tech companies accountable, protect ratepayers and improve grid planning. Their request called for reporting on hourly, annual and peak electricity use, the prices and rates companies pay, upfront payments and security deposits, load flexibility, demand-response strategies, the split between AI server use and general cloud workloads, and the cost of transmission and distribution upgrades triggered by large-load operations.

The policy push reflects how quickly data centers have become a load issue for utilities and households alike. A January report from the Congressional Research Service said U.S. data centers used about 176 terawatt-hours of electricity in 2023, or roughly 4.4% of total U.S. consumption. The report said some projections show that use could double or triple by 2028 and climb as high as 12% of national electricity demand. It also noted that no legally binding energy standards explicitly cover private-sector data-center operations.

The International Energy Agency has warned that U.S. data centers are on track to account for almost half of electricity demand growth between 2025 and 2030. The EIA’s April Annual Energy Outlook likewise says data centers are boosting demand growth and that when that demand shows up matters because it affects power-sector costs.

Warren’s office said the EIA plans a mandatory survey of data centers in the United States after the pilot studies end, no later than September 30, 2026. If that schedule holds, it would mark the first nationwide effort to measure the energy footprint of the AI economy with required reporting instead of industry estimates.